Does This Chair Make My Butt Look Fat?

PROMPT RESPONSE

A return to the Dark Room

I had 12 photos picked out. I whittled them down to five.
Now there is but one.

Why?

The other day, while gathering up all the poems I have written, I realised something. The collection of poetry was a diary. Without realising it, those lines were documenting my life’s ups and downs for the better part of a year. Putting experiences and thoughts into words and using humour as medicine.

In going through my photos for this response, I saw a similar diary laid out before me. The heartaches and joys, the celebrations and the goodbyes.
With travel kiboshed and a majority of my photos having already been traded for pennies in previous stories, most of my remaining photos from the past two years are of people. The people are family and friends and they didn’t sign up for the spotlight of fame (or the Dark Web) like I did.

Sitting down to write this prompt response, it tempted me to share a few of those photos, not for claps or sympathy or bragging rights but maybe as a catharsis — and a celebration.

There were photos of my son laying in an ICU bed, lifted from the video links with his doctors and nurses, when his mom and I could not visit him because of Covid lockdown restrictions. There were photos of my mother in her last days. Those were the lows of my poetic and photographic diary.

There were also photos of my step-daughter’s wedding of the century, my son’s miraculous recovery, and beautiful pictures of our first grandchild. The joyous highs of life.

Proof that life goes on.

But I cut those photos and re-wrote this final draft.
Some photos I removed…

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